slife 0.2.3

Terminal-based AI agent — a function-calling loop with minimum harness

Slife

Terminal-based AI agent — chat with an LLM that can execute shell commands, read and write files, search the web, call REST APIs, connect to MCP servers, spawn subagents for parallel work, communicate with other Slife instances over MQTT, and remember everything permanently.

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Terminal UI (Textual)                                     │
│  ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────  │
│  Agent Service — LLM + Tools + Loop + MCP + A2A + Inbox   │
│  ┌──────────┬─────────────┬──────────┬──────────────────┐  │
│  │ MCP Tool │ A2A + MQTT  │ Subagent │ Built-in Plugins │  │
│  │  Proxy   │ Mesh        │ Workers  │ ┌────┬────┬────┐ │  │
│  │          │             │          │ │MCP │Mem │WX  │ │  │
│  └──────────┴─────────────┴──────────┴─┴────┴────┴────┘─┘  │
│  Permanent Memory — hybrid search (grep + FTS5 + semantic)  │
└────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Install

Zero prerequisites. The install script auto-installs Python 3.13 and uv if needed — then installs slife in an isolated environment. No git, no Node.js, no C++ compiler required.

Option 1: Install Script (Recommended)

macOS / Linux / WSL:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/juzcn/slife/main/install.sh | bash

Windows PowerShell:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/juzcn/slife/main/install.ps1 | iex"

The script checks your Python version, installs uv if needed, downloads the latest slife, and installs it in an isolated environment. Inspect the script before piping if you prefer.

Option 2: uv tool install (requires git)

uv tool install git+https://github.com/juzcn/slife.git

Option 3: pipx (requires git)

pipx install git+https://github.com/juzcn/slife.git

Option 4: Try Before Installing

uvx --from git+https://github.com/juzcn/slife.git slife

No install — downloads, caches, and runs slife in a temporary environment.

After installation, the slife and credstore commands are available globally:

Command	Location
slife	~/.local/bin/slife
credstore	~/.local/bin/credstore
Package files	~/.local/share/uv/tools/slife/

Uninstall

uv tool uninstall slife

User data (conversation logs, credentials, config) remains in your project directory and OS keyring — delete manually if desired:

rm -f slife.db slife.json5               # conversation log + config
credstore delete DEEPSEEK_API_KEY          # remove a stored secret
credstore list                             # list all stored credentials

Optional Extras

Slife keeps the default install lean. Add extras when you need them:

Extra	Package	What it enables
embeddings	llama-cpp-python	Local GGUF embeddings for semantic memory search (offline, no API cost). Without it, FTS5 keyword search still works.
mqtt	paho-mqtt	A2A agent mesh via MQTT (--agent <id>). Without it, subagent spawning still works — only remote-agent discovery needs MQTT.

# Install with one or both extras:
uv tool install "slife[embeddings]" --reinstall
uv tool install "slife[mqtt]" --reinstall
uv tool install "slife[embeddings,mqtt]" --reinstall

Setting Up Local Embeddings

After installing slife[embeddings], download a GGUF model and configure it:

# 1. Download a GGUF embedding model (BGE-M3, Q4_K_M quantized, ~300 MiB)
curl -LO https://huggingface.co/ChristianAzinn/bge-m3-gguf/resolve/main/bge-m3-Q4_K_M.gguf

# 2. Launch slife and tell the agent to enable it:
slife
# > enable local embeddings with bge-m3-Q4_K_M.gguf

The agent calls memory_set_embedding which writes the config and reloads the embedder — no restart needed. Verify with:

slife
# > check embedding status

Windows users: llama-cpp-python needs a pre-built wheel (no C++ compiler required). The Vulkan variant works on any GPU and falls back to CPU:

uv tool install "slife[embeddings]" --reinstall
# Then install the platform wheel into the tool's venv:
uv tool run --from slife pip install "llama-cpp-python @ https://github.com/abetlen/llama-cpp-python/releases/download/v0.3.34-vulkan/llama_cpp_python-0.3.34-py3-none-win_amd64.whl"

Alternative CUDA wheels: v0.3.34-cu132, v0.3.34-cu125; AMD: v0.3.34-hip-radeon.

Setting Up the MQTT Mesh

After installing slife[mqtt], run a Mosquitto broker and launch with an agent identity:

# Terminal 1 — start the broker (or use your existing one)
mosquitto -p 1883

# Terminal 2 — launch slife with an agent identity
slife --agent my-agent

Configure broker address in slife.json5 if not using defaults (localhost:1883):

a2a: {
  mqtt: { host: "my-broker.local", port: 1883 },
}

Quick Start

Store your API key and launch:

credstore set-password                # first time only — sets up encrypted backup
credstore set DEEPSEEK_API_KEY        # masked input, no echo
slife

The default config (slife.json5) ships with pre-configured MCP servers (filesystem, web fetch, DuckDuckGo search).

How It Works

Slife is a function-calling loop. You type a message → the LLM decides what tools to call → Slife executes them and returns results → the LLM responds → repeat.

You: "Find all TODO comments and create GitHub issues for them"
  → LLM calls execute_shell("rg TODO")
  → LLM calls github__create_issue(...) for each one
  → LLM: "Created 7 issues. All linked in the description above."

Configuration

Slife uses a two-layer configuration model:

Layer	Storage	What goes here
Secrets	OS keyring (credstore)	API keys, tokens, passwords — encrypted at OS level
Config	slife.json5 → env:	${VAR} references + non-secret values (EDITOR, LANG, etc.)

// slife.json5
env: {
  DEEPSEEK_API_KEY: "${DEEPSEEK_API_KEY}",   // → resolved from keyring at runtime
  EDITOR: "code",                             // → plain value, no secret
}

models: {
  providers: {
    deepseek: {
      base_url: "https://api.deepseek.com",
      api_key: "${DEEPSEEK_API_KEY}",          // ← ${VAR} syntax throughout
      models: [{ model: "deepseek-v4-pro", name: "DeepSeek V4 Pro", reasoning: true }],
    },
  },
},
active_model: "deepseek/deepseek-v4-pro",

${ENV_VAR} and ${ENV_VAR:-default} syntax works everywhere — values resolve at runtime via shell → keyring → config.

Credential Management

Slife ships with credstore — a standalone cross-platform secret manager backed by the OS keyring with AES-encrypted file backup. It has its own full documentation.

Quick reference:

credstore set-password                # first-time setup
credstore set DEEPSEEK_API_KEY        # store (masked atomic dual-write)
credstore get DEEPSEEK_API_KEY        # retrieve, masked output
credstore list                        # list all stored keys
credstore status                      # backend status

Command	Description
set-password	Init cryptfile, set master key
set KEY	Atomic dual-write (cryptfile → keyring, rolls back on failure)
get KEY	Retrieve (keyring, masked)
get KEY -p	Retrieve (dual-query, plaintext)
delete KEY	Remove from both stores
list	List all stored keys
reset-keyring	Restore keyring from cryptfile backup
reset-backup	Sync keyring → cryptfile
status	Backend status

See credstore/README.md for disaster recovery, Python API, and advanced usage.

Features

Tools

All tools are unified as OpenAI function definitions — the LLM sees no difference between a native shell command, an MCP tool, or a REST API endpoint.

Category	Examples	Location
Native	execute_shell, run_python_script, get_os_info	slife/tools/*.py
MCP / REST	filesystem__read_file, fetch__get, serper__search	Via slife-mcp proxy
Skills	On-demand plugins with list_skills / use_skill	skills/ directory
CLI	Auto-discovered external commands, persisted with cli_add_tool	Runtime registration
A2A	13 protocol tools — discovery, routing, lifecycle, broadcast	slife/tools/a2a.py

Memory

Every conversation turn is permanently recorded. Hybrid search (grep + FTS5 + semantic via vec0) lets the LLM recall past work. Memory runs as a built-in plugin (slife/plugins/memory/) — a separate process so crashes never race with writes.

memory_search("ConnectionError")            → exact error trace
memory_search("MCP config", mode="fts5")    → topic search
memory_search("that bug fix", mode="hybrid")→ semantic recall
memory_search(mode="time", since="2026-07") → browse by date

User isolation via --user alice. Embedding via local GGUF (offline) or OpenAI-compatible API. See DESIGN.md § Permanent Memory for the full architecture.

Plugins

Three built-in plugins ship with Slife, all using the same MCP stdio protocol:

Plugin	Role
slife-mcp	Proxy for external MCP servers (stdio + HTTP) — 10 management tools
slife-memory	Diary database with hybrid search (FTS5 + vec0 RRF)
slife-wechat	Bidirectional WeChat messaging via iLink ClawBot API

Third-party plugins are standard MCP servers configured in slife.json5 → mcp.servers. They auto-connect on startup and their tools are discovered and registered automatically. Any MCP-compatible server — in Python, Node.js, Go, Rust, or any other language — works as a Slife plugin.

// Example: add a custom MCP server
mcp: {
  servers: {
    "my-plugin": {
      command: "uv", args: ["run", "python", "-m", "my_plugin.server"],
      env: { API_KEY: "${API_KEY}" },
      description: "My custom MCP server."
    },
  },
}

See DESIGN.md § Third-Party Plugins for the full plugin contract and configuration reference.

A2A — Agent-to-Agent

Two transports, one interface: MQTT (remote peers, enable with --agent <id>) and Subagent (local child processes, always available). The unified inbox serializes human keyboard, WeChat, MQTT, and subagent messages through a single queue — only one AgentLoop runs at a time.

Progressive Disclosure

Not all tools are in every LLM request. Three categories use lightweight summaries first:

Category	Browse	Load
Memory	memory_search / memory_list_recent	memory_open
Skills	list_skills	use_skill
MCP	mcp_list_servers / mcp_list_tools	mcp_set_disclosure("eager")

Shortcuts

Key	Action
Ctrl+C (in input)	Quit
Ctrl+C (elsewhere)	Copy (terminal-native)
Esc	Cancel agent loop
Ctrl+L	Focus input field
Home / End	Scroll to top / bottom
Any key	Auto-focus input + type

CLI Flags

Flag	Default	Description
--agent <id>	(off)	Enable A2A — join the MQTT mesh with this identity
--user <id>	default	Memory isolation key — separate diary per user

Requirements

The install script handles everything automatically. Nothing to install beforehand.

Component	Status
Python ≥ 3.13	Auto-installed via uv if missing
uv	Auto-installed if missing
Node.js	Optional — only for npx-based MCP servers
llama-cpp-python	Optional — slife[embeddings] for local GGUF embeddings
paho-mqtt	Optional — slife[mqtt] for A2A MQTT mesh

Development

git clone https://github.com/juzcn/slife.git
cd slife
uv sync
uv run slife

For all optional dependencies (embeddings + MQTT):

uv sync --all-extras

Run tests:

uv run pytest

Design

Slife is a minimum-harness agent. The harness only does what the LLM physically cannot: execute tools, maintain conversation state, stream responses, and persist memory. Everything else — reasoning, planning, tool selection, error recovery — is the LLM's job.

See DESIGN.md for the full architecture, component-level documentation, and design rationale.

License

MIT